How to Secure Mobile Devices with Enterprise Mobility Management Solutions

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The boundaries between working “in the office”, “on the road”, or “at home” have been blurred by the untethered power of smartphones, tablets, and other portable devices. Employees expect the flexibility to work on the devices they choose, and employers have come to expect always-on availability. That business requirement often conflicts with those in charge of securing corporate networks and data. In some organizations, this has led to the draconian answer “no”. But today those responses are few and far between. The norm today is, “It depends”.

One also can’t forget the microcosm of different departments within an organization, which yet again causes great debate on how much access is needed, balanced against how to protect sensitive data. For mobility’s transformative potential to be realized, IT needs to become a business partner that understands business drivers and then devises the technology roadmap to support everyone’s goals. A large amount of the point solutions that solved aspects of mobile business problems are being consolidated under Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM), which enables IT to easily put its arms around the entirety of data and security concerns in the mobile universe.

Enterprise Mobility Management:

EMM is a solution suite covering the broad spectrum of activities and policies needed to enable mobile user computing across multiple use cases. It’s a holistic methodology that can normalize the management of a multi-OS environment, integrate with existing enterprise systems, and securely extend the deluge of data from apps to content. EMM encompasses all the aspects of mobile management, enabling IT to embrace the ever-expanding mobile universe. It broadens the conversation from a device-centric model to an app- and data-centric model that incorporates enterprise and external applications, data, content, and more in a device-agnostic environment. It subsumes all of the advantages of MDM (Mobile Device Management), MAM (Mobile application Management), MCM (Mobile Content Management), and containerization into a more flexible structure. EMM can also deliver ROI on mobility, providing executive summaries and deep-dive analytics to help ascertain the true value of mobile connectivity. EMM releases organizations from having to select one device and operating system to support over others, moving companies away from point solutions that solve only a portion of the larger challenge. It can incorporate both enterprise- developed applications and third-party applications, freeing enterprises to focus on the unique intellectual property embedded in their data.

We recommend a unified mobile policy for your organization that is much more than an automatic reaction to every new “expansion” from the mobile universe.

IBM MaaS360 is our enterprise mobility management platform to enable productivity and data protection for the way people work. Thousands of organizations trust MaaS360 as the foundation for their mobility initiatives. MaaS360 delivers comprehensive management with strong security controls across users, devices, apps and content to support any mobile deployment.

For more information on IBM MaaS360, and to start a no cost 30-day trial, visit IBM Marketplace.

If you are having any questions do not hesitate to get in contact with Morten Skogvold, Nordic Security Sales Manager at morten.skogvold@no.ibm.com or with me at PETTERIA@ie.ibm.com.